"I'm a child of the world,"says Raquel Cepeda, editor in chief of the glossy OneWorld Magazine, from her Manhattan office. She says it with authority, describing her fiery attitude, optimistic perspective and artistic vision in just six words.

Cepeda, 29, is also one of the youngest women in her position at a major publication.

The first-generation Dominican American has been working as a freelance journalist for almost a decade: Her political writing has earned her reporting awards for features on politics, feminism and race.

Cepeda has served as the head honcho before: as the editor in chief of sayShe.com, a lifestyle Web site for urban women. She's also contributed to MTV News and the Village Voice, among several other publications.

Now she's responsible for creating a progressive lifestyle magazine for city dwellers, as well as a niche for a different kind of urban magazine.

She's done it in less than a year, mostly because she's a different kind of woman.

The writer-turned-editor spent a few formative years in San Francisco and a good deal of time in the Dominican Republic. But she grew up mainly in New York during the Black Panther era, which influenced her parents' generation and would later inspire her to do activist work.

Cepeda says she became a journalist because of her experiences as a young woman of color and her passion for the communities she lived in as a young girl. "When I was younger, I thought I was going to be a singer and a music writer," she says. "I'm very happy with the hand destiny has dealt me."

ONE LOVE, ONEWORLD

Her love for hip-hop began in the mid-'80s, when she was in the midst of what she calls "a brewing pot of talent" and was a performance poet with aspirations of becoming a rapper. The music of A Tribe Called Quest and De La Soul prompted her to express herself via the written word, and she performed with the likes of the Roots, Saul Williams and Tony Medina.

"When you write poetry, you just end up writing (everything)," she says, explaining her foray into journalism. Not only did she derive inspiration from the work of her peers, but she continued to look for ways to contribute to the burgeoning culture.

With hip-hop pioneers approaching their mid-30s and early 40s, the culture could use a more adult perspective. Magazines dedicated to exploring hip-hop or urban culture, like Vibe or the Source, have appealed mainly to twentysomethings with generic profiles of artists, reviews of new album releases and flashy spreads on video games or gadgets. But they're the bigwigs of hip-hop journalism, and for a long time, there was no alternative.

Finally, there's another option for the intelligent urban mind, and much like the woman at its helm, OneWorld magazine is bold and refreshing.

The magazine whose slogan asks "What Is Urban?" was reintroduced in December after a test issue in 1994. The new OneWorld has an eclectic look and offers a crisper image and design, and a fresh perspective on bohemian style.

OneWorld can be slightly R-rated in its approach as far as scantily clad models are concerned, but the content smacks of hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons' influence. Like his ventures into comedy, poetry and fashion, the publication he directs exposes the complexities behind beats, rhymes and life for a new generation of progressive thinkers in the urban world.

The attention to global hip-hop (from New Zealand to the American Indian nation) and a foray into short stories are territory that few other magazines with a circulation of 200,000 would tackle.

Despite a small staff of five, the bimonthly magazine owned by entrepreneur Simmons seems to have the range of his other business enterprises -- blending the social context of hip-hop with popular celebrities, models and writers.

Cepeda is responsible for overseeing the design and content, which includes quirky interviews with unpredictable celebrities like musician Cree Summer, an essay from the recently imprisoned rapper John Forte and a profile of author Rebecca Walker.

Cepeda's own musical preferences are wide -- from the Jungle Brothers to Fela Kuti and beyond. She was raised listening to Latin music and later heard the influence in the hip-hop music created in the late '70s and early '80s. She was also surrounded by musicians in her family and played classical piano for 12 years.

"I was always taught to be a thinker, to ask questions and to think about my community," she says.

Her activism and love for art have always been intertwined and encouraged by her family members. While her classmates at Hunter College went on to become music-industry executives or rappers, Cepeda studied film. She befriended hip-hop's Talib Kweli in college -- and Kweli just made his journalistic debut in the July/August issue interviewing Dead Prez, a politically focused duo from Brooklyn who grace the cover wearing Afghan-style turbans.

Cepeda likes the direction OneWorld is taking, and hopes to transform it into an urban version of Vanity Fair. In the course of a day, she says, she meets with new writers, edits, does research to see what's going on in the world.

When she's not networking or designing the magazine, she is with her 5-year- old daughter, Djali.

Cepeda's goals include writing fiction and books about international hip- hop. But for now, she is working steadily on cultivating OneWorld as the voice of a maturing hip-hop generation.

"I want OneWorld to create conversation on what hip-hop really is," she adds. "Hip-hop is so embryonic; it's nowhere near being over."